When I wake in the wee hours of the morning, the darkness comforts me. It is heavy, grounding, peaceful. The stillness is alluring. I turn on as little light as possible to protect my ostensible solitude. Darkness invites me inward, a natural encouragement toward pratyahara, the practice of withdrawing the senses. And as the business of life falls away, if only for a moment, my being is allowed freedom to explore questions such as the purpose of life, and what is it that I really love (different versions of the same question really.) If only for a moment, clarity seeps into awareness.

Resistance Stretching is a one-on-one hands-on approach to building strength and flexibility. It’s personal training that feels a bit like a workout and a massage rolled into one session. In a resistance stretching session the trainer assesses your body’s strengths, weaknesses and imbalances and then guides your body through strength training while stretching. When muscles are long, strong and balanced, we move with ease and grace, without pain or limitations.

Resistance Stretching builds on current biomechanical understanding, to increase the healthy range of motion of a joint you need to build strength at the end of the range of motion. Therefore, we engage muscles as we lengthen them rather than relaxing into stretch. Engaged extension is referred to as an eccentric contraction. When the muscle can be strong eccentrically at full length, the nervous system trusts the muscles to protect the joint, and allows the connective tissue to lengthen further. This directly results in increased balance, flexibility and range. Graceful is the word we use to describe bodies with balance, flexibility and strength.

Lisa is studying resistance stretching with Anne Tierney of Ki-Hara Resistance Stretching. Anne works with professional athletes, from Olympic Gold-Medalists, to NFL teams, MLB players, and pro-Golfers. And yes, while Resistance Stretching is great for athletes, it is also great for you. The one-on-one hands-on approach is easily adapted to all bodies.

Check out what people have to say after a Resistance Stretching Session:“It’s like a massage from the inside out.”“My back pain is gone!”“I feel stronger and more fluid.”“Released my quads, my hamstrings, my SI joints, and my groin. Wonderful work. I’ll be walking around lighter all day.”“Wow, that felt good.”"The technique is definitely effective. It is by nature, safe and personalized. "

"Working with Lisa on resistance stretching was a delightful and dreamy experience that felt like a cross between receiving a massage, and engaging in a strong, nurturing, guided, hands-on stretch sequence. She is intuitive and an expert of biomechanics, a pro at handling and guiding the body through the exercises in this method. I really appreciate how the method asks the practitioner to employ strength to work toward flexibility and greater range of motion; it feels sustainable and has a quality of "correctness" in the body. Like- "yes.... this is really good for me!" Resistance stretching is a wonderful complement to a yoga practice and certainly a complement to athletic pursuits like jogging, climbing, etc. "

Walt Whitmen wrote of love as a "subtle electric fire. . . playing within." While practicing Ki-Hara Resistance Stretching with Lisa, I remembered this quote again and again because my body felt like the love and the movement of Ki-Hara, the electric fire. The technique integrated my joints and reminded me of what it was like to move fully and easefully. I left the sessions feeling sore but liberated because I knew that the limitations and habit-patterns my body has held so long need not be life-long.